Originally Posted by
bomarc
few cloudy
I think you make an important point. none of us as airline pilots would, in the course of smooth manual flight, "flick" the rudder around...or any controls really.
(recall how over controlling the 757 at KSEA was shown during a crosswind landing...see other thread(hairy xwind landing)...it didn't come apart.
the copilot in this crash probably wouldn't either, especially after the admonishment some years earlier while on the 727 (which did seem to survive the rudder movement).
all of this makes me think that there is more than meets the eye to the crash in question. that something happened in a different sequence than we are lead to believe.
I am sure that If I danced on the rudders at 200+knots I would make myself quite air sick. that should be a limiting factor in and of itself.
On a scale of 1-100 abrupt rudder inputs at 160 kts is similar to taking off in gusty conditions. Call it a 10. 210 kts rudder inputs would be 20-30, and 250 kt rudder inputs are 100.
The magnitude of the lateral movement/load increases exponentially. So much so that the AA pilots union had expert testimony about the sensitivity being close to a POI response rate.